That's one thing Earthlings might learn to do, if they tried hard enough: Ignore the awful times and concentrate on the good ones.

Her face ... was a one-of-a-kind, a surprising variation on a familiar theme - a variation that made observers think, Yes - that would be another very nice way for people to look. What Beatrice had done with her face, actually, was what any plain girl could do. She overlaid it with dignity, suffering, intelligence, and a piquant dash of bitchiness.

I wish that people who are conventionally supposed to love each other would say to each other, when they fight, "Please - a little less love, and a little more common decency."

This is what I find encouraging about the writing trades: ... They allow lunatics to seem saner than sane.

I've got news for Mr. Santayana: we're doomed to repeat the past no matter what. That's what it is to be alive.

We are what we pretend to be.

What a bummer it is to be a human being.